"I never judge them": 'Good Sam's Marco Grazzini on playing the manipulative antagonist Jack Hansen
'Good Sam', Netflix's new "feel-good" whodunnit is, at first look, all rainbows and sunshine. The film follows "bummer-beat" reporter Kate Bradley as she is on a break from her usual breaking news stories and is assigned a supposed fluff piece about a mysterious good Samaritan who leaves $100,000 on random doorsteps in New York. Tiya Sircar plays the role of reporter Kate Bradley in the film, which is directed by Kate Melville and based on a book of the same name by Dete Meserve. Through the course of the film, many issues like corruption in politics and toxic workplace culture are explored, although it does not delve deeply into any of these.
Jack Hansen, an aspiring Congressman who wants to marry Bradley, is the closest the film has to an antagonist, as he uses the 'Good Sam' mystery to his advantage. Hansen's role is played by Marco Grazzini and is a convincing, manipulative, ambitious young investor and politician who seems to be an exact mirror image of many such characters we see in real life. But Grazzini has a slightly different way of looking at Hansen's character.
"Jack Hansen wants to have a successful career, and possibly find love. Now, who doesn't want that, right?" said the actor in an exclusive interview with MEA WorldWide (MEAWW). He added that whenever he gets the opportunity to play a character that is of "questionable moral character, I try to humanize them by identifying their goals and dreams and I never judge them."
Hansen turns out to be the "bad guy" in the film mostly because of his drive to become successful, which is the character's only motivation. Speaking about how he connected with the character, Grazzini said: "Early on in my homework for Jack, I identified that there should be a definite 'transactional nature' in his everyday interactions and relationships — always looking for better leverage." Hansen's opportunistic thinking is what sets him apart as the antagonist in the film. "I mean we all do it to some degree in our everyday lives (right?), I just needed to turn that up to max for this role," added Grazzini.
'Good Sam' premiered on Netflix on May 16 and also stars Jesse Camacho, Marc Camacho, Kenny Wong, Elana Dunkelman, and Daniela Sandiford.
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